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Taking care of your patio furniture

September 14, 2019 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

As soon as the first rays of the sun warm the earth in the spring, many people pull it out into the garden. Terraces and balconies bring a little piece of nature in which you can feel comfortable and relax. Patio furniture is part of it. Modern patio and garden furniture are robust and durable. Even bad weather is usually easily overcome with the right care. Patio furniture made of solid wood is in line with garden and balcony design trends. The natural material adapts wonderfully to the environment and gives warmth and security. But also solid wood garden furniture needs proper care to last for a long time.

The offer of patio furniture near me is endless. The number one garden, terrace, and balcony are wooden garden furniture. And not without reason. The furniture has an almost unlimited lifetime. While the plastic table and chair become unsightly over time and are covered with signs of wear, wooden furniture can be refurbished again and again. In addition, there is the environmental factor where wood is easily recyclable. Patio furniture made of solid wood remains beautiful for a long time with little care.

Plastic pollutes the environment for many centuries. In our seas, there are whole islands of plastic waste, which are a considerable threat to the ecosystem. Your decision for wooden garden furniture is a life-long decision. For you, this also brings financial benefits because, in terms of lifetime, wood furniture is a lot cheaper than plastic furniture.
So, how to maintain patio furniture made of solid wood?

The effort for the care is relatively low. Here are some types of wood, but more demanding than others. So, you should choose the right kind of wood if you rarely want to care for your furniture. Furniture made of teak, Robinia, or bangkirai is particularly robust. In general, loungers, tables, and chairs made of hardwoods are less caring and durable than furniture made of softwoods. Softwoods must be well maintained outdoors and treated with appropriate wood preservation. Hardwoods have unique ingredients that make them more resistant to pests and also reduce the care required.

Modern patio furniture made of wood is pre-treated today. For the first time, a simple cleaning with water or a light soapy solution is sufficient. Aggressive cleaning agents should not be used on wood. The scouring cream belongs by no means to the surfaces. It is beneficial if you cover the furniture when not in use and thus protect against moisture and UV radiation.

Category: Blog

What should you know about the golf GPS watch?

September 8, 2019 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

Do you use a golf GPS clock? If not, you’ve probably wondered if range finders add value to your score.

The benefits of a GPS golf watch result from the exact distances to the green – usually even green start, middle, and end. On many models, you can also read distances to obstacles. Surely it has happened to you once or even more often: A good blow, which missed the wrong target by the wrong estimation of the distance by eye or by vague markings such as distance markings.

With a GPS clock, you have a specific meter and can specifically select the matching racket. Long-term additional advantage: By measuring distances regularly, you will become better acquainted with the range of your individual clubs.

The data for the distance measurement refers to the software of the GPS-based clocks from a manufacturer-dependent database. Most of the time, there are already thousands of golf courses preinstalled worldwide when buying a golf watch. Updates for reconciliation after re-surveying a place as well as for loading new golf courses are available to you after the purchase usually free of charge as a service. To download, you need only the manufacturer-dependent software – often just an app for your smartphone.

What do you think is the right golf watch for your needs?

The offer on the market is large, and in addition to specialized manufacturers as well as providers of related industries, offer no name vendors their products. It is true that even if the functions hardly differ at first glance, you will quickly notice that the differences in processing, user-friendliness, readability, and features are great.

Loading updates, battery life, and design, size, and comfort also matter when it comes to finding the right golf watch for you. Unfortunately, the only real golf watch on the market that meets the needs of each user does not exist.

Category: Blog

Environmental benefits of having a garden

September 1, 2019 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

A garden doesn’t only beautify your outdoor area but also add value in any property. Modern home with garden creates an aesthetic look to any home. Apart from beautification and adding value, a garden also has many environmental benefits. In this article, I am going to discuss few ecological benefits of having a garden.

1)     Pollution reduction

A garden can play an important role in the reduction of pollution. All the species needs clean air for breathing. Plants take carbon dioxide and release oxygen in the environment. In this way, it provides clean air to live in. If you have a garden in front of your home, you can get fresh air all the time which can also help reducing pollution.

2)     Clean groundwater

Plants help to clean the groundwater. The chemicals and bacteria can be filtered with the plants. If you use a lawnmower for mowing your garden regularly, you will get cleaner surface and water as well. For the lawnmower, you can visit reservdelaronline

3)     Reduction of carbon footprint

If you grow vegetables and fruits in your garden, you don’t need to purchase these from the superstore. You never know the things you are purchasing from the superstore, how these are being manufactured, and how these are being processed. However, the products we buy from the superstore come to us after completing a lot of processes. So, cultivating necessary vegetables and fruits instead of buying, we can reduce carbon footprint.

4)     A balanced eco-system

A garden can be a home and a source of foods for many species. You can feed and provide shelter to a lot of animals, insects, and reptiles. You can create a great eco-system in your garden without any effort. The way plants can provide you foods, can also be a food source for many other species.

5)     Reduce erosion

Plants can reduce erosion and create a solid base on the ground. The roots of the plants hold soil and reduce erosion. So, to strengthen the area and surroundings of your home, gardening can be a great choice.

6)     Saves energy

Planting more and more trees, you can save energy. When you plant more trees, you can get more natural air. Trees can keep your home cool in the summer and hot in the winter. So, you can feel the normal temperature on the presence of trees all the time. The natural shades will save your electricity bill up to 60%.

So, a garden can provide a lot of environmental benefits along with providing different benefits directly. If you want to maintain a balanced eco-system, you should create a garden. The more tree you will plant, the more benefits you will create for yourself and the environment.

Category: Blog

Why should not you choose laminate as flooring material?

August 26, 2019 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

Laminate flooring also has some drawbacks that make it not suitable for any room or use. Though many people choose laminate as a flooring material for the low price, the quality it delivers can’t satisfy all. On the argument of laminate flooring or engineered hardwood flooring, engineered wood flooring will always be the winner. Here I am providing a few reasons why you should not install laminate flooring.

  • The popularity is going down

Thanks to its structure, the flooring is considered loud, especially when it is laid floating directly on the screen. Remedy special documents, which among other things, reduce the impact sound audibly. Modern laminate already contains an insulating layer for more soundproofing. However, this also drives up the price.

  • It is not 100 percent waterproof

Laminate is not 100% waterproof compared to tiles and can swell at the joints. This makes it less suitable for wet rooms such as bathrooms or kitchens. However, manufacturers also offer variants with special moisture protection.

  • It is foot cold without underfloor heating

Without underfloor heating, the floor is very cold, because it insulates heat.

  • Laminate can’t be abraded

Despite the durable seal, deep scratches or holes can be created over the years. For example, when a larger knife or pot falls to the ground. Sanding is not possible in the same way as for hardwood. Quirks can only be provisionally filled with hard wax or a matching wood paste. Alternatively, you have to change the board. Simple laminate lasts about eight to ten years. If the quality is good, then for 15 years. Some manufacturers even give up to 30 years warranty.

  • Not pure nature

Laminate is not real wood. Although the core contains a lot of wood, the top layer only pretends to be the oak. Thus, the feet are not on unadulterated nature. Also, in terms of sustainability, the flooring remains behind the qualities of parquet.

Which room is laminate suitable for?

In principle, you can use laminate as a floor covering in any room – it depends on how resistant your selection is. Particularly suitable is the flooring for the living room, the bedroom, and the hallway.

For kitchen and bathroom laminate is only partially suitable. In damp rooms, tiles are generally the better choice. Anyone who chooses laminate flooring can look forward to a chic, durable, and easy-care all-rounder. It is an inexpensive alternative to the wooden floor- for bathroom and kitchen but only limited recommended.

So, if you are looking for a material which would last for a long time and give you a better finish and look, you can go for engineered wood flooring.

Category: Guest Post

Important Things about hardwood floor according to the lifestyles

August 25, 2019 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

The individuals should know about the species of hardwood floors to choose suitable flooring. First of all, you should understand your lifestyle. You can know which floor designs make you feel comfortable and happy. So, knowing the lifestyle will give the advantage of making a decision to the floor designs. According to the different home designs, there are various varieties with wooden pieces. You can go with Greywash solid oak floating floor and get more information on hardwood flooring. You should make a decision for your kitchen and rooms that you need to cover with the hardwood flooring.

Why need durable hardwood floors?

The durability is an important thing that we should discuss the hardwood flooring. The individuals need to choose more durable wooden that comes with solid quality. The solid wood pieces are coming with the extra protection that will impact on your flooring. Sometimes the floor gets the problems because of the wet areas, so you need to go with the solid wooden pieces. The pieces are coming in different designs and colors and providing durability. Another reason to choose the solid hardwood is fire protection. Hope that you have understood why we need solid wooden flooring with durability. So, now you can search for the hardwood flooring facilities with no trouble.

All about hardwood

The hardwood is used for multiple purposes, for example, furniture and floors. To the floors, the individuals can get extra durability by choosing the solid floors you can know more about the floors by Greywash solid oak floating floor and take the information of the hardwood pieces. The solid wooden floor provides real wood from the top layer of the floor. The individuals should know about some points which are given below:

• There are different trees that are the source of solid wooden flooring. You can get different qualities with the trees.
• The hardwood comes with the durability that last years.
• With the wooden flooring, there are some layers for the protection of the floors from the wet areas. You can solve the moisture-related problems by choosing solid wood.

Need of Greywash solid oak floating floors

There are many companies that are giving the opportunity of easier wooden flooring installation. The Greywash solid oak floating floor is a good option for you. The individuals can take many benefits from this floating. Now, you can get simple installation with the wood pieces and get durability and protection of the laminated woods. With easiklip, you have the solid floating floors and can make your room or kitchen good-looking. There are some professionals that will help you to the installation, and you can take advice for the size of the wooden pieces to use on the floors.

Know about laminate wood

The laminate wood protects your complete floor from many problems. The laminate wood is also known as floating wooding. If you want to know about the wood, then you can go with Greywash solid oak floating floor to get more information. A person can make the best selection of the floor according to the lifestyle. The laminated woods are simple to install, and they are used for increasing the attractiveness of your home.

Category: Blog

Few benefits of drinking natural soda

February 2, 2019 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

Many people want to avoid soda for containing added sugar. But they also have many nutritional values which we most are not aware of. Some soda drinks also contain caffeine which is also harmful to our body. However, natural soda doesn’t contain any added sugar and also full of nutritional value. It has many health benefits for our body.

Some of the benefits of drinking soda are discussed below-

Keep you hydrated for a long time

Soda can keep you hydrated for a long time in hot summer days. Though water is the best source to hydrate your body, some of us tend to drink a very low quantity of water. It is important to drink 6 to 8 glasses of fluid every day. So, if you are not fulfilling the need of your body by drinking water, you can switch to the other source of water. Drinking natural soda can hydrate your body naturally. If you can drink soda without containing sugar and caffeine, it can be a great alternative to water and help you to become hydrated for a long time.

No added sugar

Sugar is the unhealthiest thing for our body. Sugar can increase obesity, form diabetes, high cholesterol, and develop so many diseases. You can be overweight for having too much sugar. If you want to avoid sugar in any kind of fizzy drink or soda, you should take soda of wave soda. As no extra pop is added in these sodas, you can enjoy the drink as much as you want without the fear of having high calories.

No caffeine

Almost all of the sodas contain caffeine. Caffeine is harmful to our body in many ways. Though taking a moderate amount of caffeine is good for our body, but a regular intake of caffeine might create dependency. It can stimulate the nervous system of our body, which is not good for our health. Caffeine can instantly boost up your mind and also the cognitive function of the body. But regular consumption can damage the different function of your body. So, it is advised not to drink anything containing caffeine regularly. Natural drink of wave soda contains no caffeine. So, it is safe for your body.

No artificial sweetness

In sodas which contain no sugar usually, are full with artificial sweetness. Artificial sweetness is more harmful than actual sugar. So, while buying any soda, you will need to find out if the drink contains sugar or artificial sweet. Artificial sweet can increase calories intake of your body. The fizz of wave soda contains no artificial sweetness. So, you can drink it without being worried.

So, these are few benefits of drinking natural soda of wave soda.

 

Category: Lifestyle

Is Your Compassion Fake

October 15, 2016 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

Today we have the first in a new series of guest posts. Today’s writer has chosen to stay anonymous, and his post is a sobering reminder of the saying, “It’s not what you say, it’s what you do that matters.” If we preach compassion, we also need to practice it. Otherwise, our words will have little impact, or might even make people distrust us.

 

I consider myself to be a compassionate person. I am concerned about others in society, both within Britain and further afield in Europe in the rest of the world. The fact that people are starving to death or becoming victims of war is not something I am happy to ignore. I’m not content with it.

I hold down a full time job. Like everyone else, I am busy nearly all the time, but I will always try to help out where I can when others less fortunate than me need it. I would never feel the need to mention this to other people in normal conversation – I know I do what I can and nobody else really needs to know. I don’t like lecturing other people on what they should or should not do (at least directly). Maybe I should talk to other people about why I think compassion is important more often, but this would make me feel like I’m by implication suggesting they become more like me and that I have a superior attitude to compassion than them. It’s not something I would feel comfortable doing. I do my bit. There are people who will do much more than me and they deserve huge respect. Let’s leave it t that.

Part of why I feel this way perhaps comes from personal experience. A few years ago, in my teens, I became a community councillor in a region of the UK. I had no prior experience in anything remotely similar before. I was younger and less experienced than all the other community councillors by some margin.

In technical terms, a community council should: “represent the views of the community to the council,” effectively holding councillors to account with the wishes of the local community. There were about 35 places for community councillors on this body, but only 25 people nominated themselves so there was no election – each person was there purely because they wanted to be. With it, each community councillor would regularly get local newspaper coverage and be asked for their opinion on various local issues, so each community councillor gained at least a bit of a profile locally.

Before I began this role, I would happily have subscribed to the view that anyone who talked about their own sense of compassion and encouraged others to be like-minded was undoubtedly in reality a compassionate and caring individual. I look back on that now as being naive. I set out as a community councillor to do what the role was described as – to make the community’s voice heard. That, to me, meant making sure those who couldn’t easily make their voices heard had a chance to make this happen. That in turn meant helping those who were, for whatever reason, weaker and more vulnerable. I was under the impression all the other community councillors would have subscribed to a similar vision of what their role was. I quickly found this to be naive too.

One of the first issues for the community council was to take a position over a planning application for some new houses on an area of land close to green belt. It had been rejected by the council before as there wasn’t enough “affordable housing” on the scheme to justify building here. The community council as a body voted to support it, but this hadn’t made any difference. However, this time the developer submitted a redesigned plan with a good percentage of “affordable housing” and a part of the site being developed by a housing association. As a response, one community councillor wrote in the local newspaper directly in support of this new application. The letter he wrote focused on the housing association housing, and how people should support the application because this would help those in most need of housing to have a chance of a proper home. He believed we should follow his example of compassion for those less well off financially – people in desperate need of good housing was more important than concerns over green belt issues. We should think about compassion and support the application.

That seemed reasonable to me. A good man, concerned for the future of his community.

Fast forward a few weeks and the official decision was taken to approve the application. Then two things happened that came as a bit of a shock. Firstly, I found out that the community councillor who wrote the letter urging us to be more considerate about people who need affordable housing had a wife on the board of directors of the property development company who made the application. Secondly, I witnessed this community councillor in conversation with another community councillor He appeared quite chirpy, presumably delighted that his wife’s company was set to make a lot of money in a new housing development. I hope I don’t need to spell out any further what was going on here.

I’d love to say this was an isolated incident but it wasn’t. I soon learned that the majority of these community councillors did not care one bit about what they were supposed to be doing. Making the community’s voice heard was certainly not high on their agenda.

Most had their own pet projects, ones that directly affected them or their clique. Examples include rejecting planning applications that would have a negative affect on a friend’s property. Or the time a community councillor wrote a piece in support of a certain discount supermarket chain getting permission to build a big store on an area not zoned for this, citing: “the need for an more affordable places to buy groceries for those struggling to make ends meet.” His pal was the regional manager of the chain at that time. Yet again, I’d catch him making comments in private that revealed him not to have cared about the people he claimed to care about. Yet he preached about compassion. Stuff like this, I’m afraid, went on and on.

Then there was the other type of false compassion I discovered. It was genuinely excruciating to see the contempt some people actually held most of the community in. I witnessed people making remarks where they clearly felt they were superior to the more working-class people in their communities, but had no obvious business interest to justify their phoney compassionate public outbursts. I began to realise that making these statements encouraging compassion in public was nothing more than vehicle to give then the sense of being “guardian-like.” Lecturing others on principle made them feel good and important, and members of the public looking up to them approvingly made them feel respected and significant. My judgement here is up for debate, but I’m confident I’m right.

Unfortunately, these experiences mean I now immediately view anyone preaching compassion suspiciously. I’m sorry this is the case, and you can blame me if you like, but my natural reaction is to wonder if it is genuine. Keep in mind that this was all at local level and not amongst any people with any truly meaningful far-reaching powers. Bluntly, this was all small-time stuff. But I see no reason why all the symptoms I encountered don’t occur at a lever of national and international government. Examples of this actually happening are, unfortunately, easy to point out.

For instance, in Scotland, last year we had a referendum where the nationalist side argued Scotland should be independent, saying that Scots are different from other parts of the UK. We, they suggested, were a more compassionate nation than cold-hearted Tory England. We needed rid of this burden to build a more left wing, caring nation of Scotland on its own. Now, I believe compassion should never stop at an arbitrary border.

A big player during the independence referendum was subsequently elected as an MP this year for the SNP. She spoke about the need for a more compassionate independent Scotland and said we needed to take this opportunity to vote for independence to have the chance to be more humane. Her campaign literature stated “…let’s end the Westminster way of doing things, which has caused misery for Scotland’s most vulnerable.” SNP colleagues supported her, one saying: “She has demonstrated a commitment to how business can be used to support social justice.” Another said “…what stood out is her commitment to social justice and how we support the poorest in society.” Clearly, we should elect this woman as an MP to represent Scotland. She was an example of compassion. We should follow her example.

As of the end of September 2015, this MP is being investigated for mortgage fraud. It has been revealed she owns 17 properties across the country, which she lets out. One of the properties was purchased in pretty sickening circumstances. She allegedly bought the property at a knocked down price from an elderly woman with cancer who was desperate to sell her home. She then re-sold the property only hours later to one of her friends for a price closer to the real market value, making a profit of tens of thousands of pounds. This is a woman who “fights for social justice”. When she preaches about compassion, it is fraudulent. Sorry about this.

The trouble is, there are genuinely compassionate people who would love to spread their message and encourage us all to think about our fellow human beings in a kinder way. And what I have outlined serves to hinder this. I believe many people like me, have witnessed similar situations of betrayal, and are automatically suspicious of anyone talking in a holier-than-thou manner. I also believe that it shows some people are just corrupt in the sense that they do not care about other people less fortunate than them. This is a fact of life – it would be unrealistic to think that everyone is really a kind-hearted soul deep down.

I do believe that the majority of people do care about others and are decent people. Some people just need to unlock it. But there is a huge challenge to those aiming to spread compassion, because people like me will immediately question whether you are genuine and worth listening to at all.

Join the Discussion

What do you think? Have you had experiences similar to those this writer describes and do you also find it hard to trust? Do you think it’s unrealistic to think that everyone is really a kind-hearted soul deep down? Or do those people who don’t seem compassionate just need to unlock their decency and caring? Let us know your experiences and views in the comments…

Category: Compassion

Compassion Wins

July 23, 2016 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

As most readers of this blog will know, 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion began in January 2015 in response to the Charlie Hebdo murders, the murder of school children in Pakistan and the Boko Haram massacres in Nigeria. Sometimes it feels as if the world is becoming increasingly less compassionate and more violent, that isn’t the case. Professor Steven Pinker of Harvard University says we should look to data, not headlines, and that with the exception of the Syrian conflict, data shows we are actually becoming more peaceful.  Other researchers say the picture isn’t quite so clear and that while overall, Pinker is right, some violent areas are becoming more violent.

One thing is clear though – the world still needs compassion. Our 1000 plus Voices need to keep speaking for compassion.

When I posted in a Facebook group asking if other bloggers would like to join me for a one-day event writing about compassion, I had no idea if anyone would say yes, and never dreamed we’d still be going a year and a half later.

Of course, people did say yes, and we are still here. Not only are we still here, but we have some incredibly exciting news.

That very first blog post I wrote, 1000 Voices Speak For Compassion, has won a blogging award. This is from an email I received from BlogHer at the end of June:

We’re thrilled to inform you that your piece, “1000 Voices Speak for Compassion,” was nominated in the Impactcategory and made it through a minimum of three rounds of judging with at least two judges each round, and has been selected as a 2016 Voices of the Year Honoree!

If BlogHer was thrilled to inform me, I was equally thrilled to be informed! Dancing up and down and bouncing to tell someone thrilled.

Except, I couldn’t. Not straight away at least. The email also said that not all submitters had been informed of the results and asked Honorees to say quiet until BlogHer made the official announcement.

For those of you who don’t know what BlogHer is – it’s “a new kind of media company, created in partnership by, for and with women, and men, who are leaders across blogs and social media and are passionately committed to quality content.” BlogHer has an audience of 100 million across blogs and social media.

Each year, BlogHer has a conference somewhere in the USA, with keynote speakers, workshops and of course with presentations of the 2016 Voices of the Year Honoree awards.

So folks, this is a big deal!

The conference is in Los Angeles this year, and I’m in the UK, so I won’t be able to go, but luckily one of our admins, Roshni, is going instead! I’m so pleased that she could take my place because Roshni has been with 1000 Voices from the start, and has been such a hard working member of the admin team. She looks after the Twitter account, as well as contributing to in the Facebook group and page. Roshni also just a lovely, lovely person so I am so glad she could go to the BlogHer 2016 conference to collect the award.

Truly, truly, truly, while I may have written the posts on Facebook and my blog inviting people to join, without Roshni and the other admins, 1000 Voices Speak For Compassion would never have got going and would be going still today.

I feel this honour is for 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion, for all of us. Everyone, every member contributed. THANK YOU.

I’m also delighted to say that I am not the only “Voice” from our group to be a Voice of the Year Honoree. Hasty Dawn Words also won one of the awards in the Impact category for her #BeReal campaign. Darla Halyk won in the Written Work (long) category for her blog post: My Gambling Addiction Drove Me to Break the Law and Alexandra Rosas’s post Past, Present, Future: What It Feels Like to Look at Your Children won in the MOMents category (MOMents is sponsored by Merck for Mothers, hence the capitals.) The posts in this category are about the joy of bringing a new life into this world.

Congratulations to Hasty, Darla and Alexandra!

This month our theme is Compassion and Courage, and I’d just like to say while it’s easy to think of courage as grand leaps and big gestures, every leap begins with a tiny action. A small child climbs up steps before she whooshes down a slide. You lift your heels and point your arms before you dive into water, you pick up a pen before you apply for your dream job. The courage comes to you with that first action and we all have courage in small ways as well as big.

Your fingers hit the keyboard before your words reach the page for your post for 1000 Voices Speak For Compassion’s link-up on Compassion and Courage. You have courage. Now keep going, let the words keep flowing and join us with your post!

This month, 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion continues to work toward a better world with a focus on Compassion and Courage.

Write a relevant post and add it to the link-up right here by clicking the blue button below.

Here’s how to get involved:

Join 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion on Facebook

Follow this blog

Follow @1000Speak on Twitter

Use the #1000Speak hashtag across social media.

Category: Gratitude

#1000Speak June – A Home Remedy for the World

June 22, 2016 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

I’ve been thinking so much about the various news stories splayed across the headlines lately.

It seems no matter where you are across the globe, there is a story about something negative. Gorillas, alligators, mass shootings, politics, health care, animal cruelty, unemployment, gun control… I could go on, but I won’t. You know what the headlines and the horrors are in the world. You know that behind every headline is so much more of the story than we will ever know from reading the news. Maybe those stories are somehow better than what is presented; maybe they are worse. But at the end of the day, no matter the story, the overarching problem I see is that the world is sick.

I have a vague memory of a cartoon drawing of the earth with a cold – or something – and that’s what comes to mind lately. Our world is sick and it needs some kind of remedy. But what? I see quotes and memes go by on my computer screen all the time suggesting what might help: The world needs love. The world needs faith. The world needs compassion.

It’s all true.

But how do we begin to heal a world that on some days seems so far gone?

As I prepared to write this post over the last few weeks, this question goaded me and made me forget every idea I thought I had to share here. I couldn’t help coming back to this nagging question of what must we DO in order to help our world, help one another?

We need to get back to basics. We need to start with the closest, simplest task and that is to heal our Selves.

My #1000Speak posts tend to focus on self-compassion and I suppose my words here will be no different. If we want to see change on a global level, we have to start on a personal level. As I thought more and more about this, I suddenly remembered some words I encounter very often at a place I visit regularly, but rarely take time to see. The words I’ll share with you here are from Robert Rodale and his wife, Ardath Harter Rodale, two people who dedicated their lives to improving not only their own lives, but the lives of others in various ways. Consider how their words might be applied on a very intimate, individual, and personal level, but also consider how they might be applied on a much larger scale.

“Health is the ability to find superior powers of body and mind and to use them for full, fruitful, and enjoyable living.”

“Every living thing has an inner urge to get better. To renew. To use the power of life to heal from within.”

~Robert Rodale

 

“May your eyes be filled with the light of sunshine to invigorate every part of your body, mind, and spirit.”

“May health and love flow through your veins to bring you peace and harmony.”

~Ardath Harter Rodale

I know, I know. Given the magnitude and frequency of negativity in the headlines lately, how can we think that such simple and wholesome ideas would make a difference?  How is it possible to believe there is such light and hope and power in the world when there is so much evidence to the contrary? Maybe if we can take even just a little bit of that positive thinking, that conviction that all living things have the potential for good, for change, and for health, we might see the world – and the people in it – in a different light. Maybe we can be gentler with ourselves, kinder and more compassionate to one another, more understanding and accepting of ourselves and of one another.

What we need is a good old fashioned home remedy like Grandma’s chicken soup or hot tea with lemon. There may not be much proof of whether or not it will work, but it can’t hurt to hope and it can’t hurt to try. Try compassion. Try kindness. Try love. See if it helps. See if it makes you feel better. It certainly can’t make things any worse.

This month, 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion continues to work toward a better, more compassionate world.

Here’s how to get involved:

Join 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion on Facebook

Visit the 1000Speak blog

Follow @1000Speak on Twitter

Use the #1000Speak hashtag across social media.

This month’s link up is open and ready for your posts and will remain open until June 28th.  To join in the Link-up and read more posts, click the blue button below and follow the instructions.

Category: Self-Compassion

Self-Compassion Heals

May 19, 2016 //  by admin//  Leave a Comment

“Compassion isn’t some kind of self-improvement project or ideal that we’re trying to live up to. Having compassion starts and ends with having compassion for all those unwanted parts of ourselves, all those imperfections that we don’t even want to look at.”

Pema Chodron

Compassion is what 1000 Voices Speak For Compassion is all about. As Pema Chodron says in the quote above, this does start and end with having compassion for the parts of ourselves we consider flaws. Self-compassion is not something you do once but is a lifelong process. Each time you see some aspect of yourself that you don’t like, try forgiving it instead.

Does this seem hard? Then just do the best you can.

As Christopher Germer says:

“A moment of self-compassion can change your entire day. A string of such moments can change the course of your life.”

 

It’s no secret that most people find it harder to be compassionate with themselves than they do with other people. So just one moment of kindness towards ourselves can make a difference in a day that otherwise would be filled with self-punishment.

However, as Louise Hay says:

“Remember, you have been criticizing yourself for years and it hasn’t worked. Try approving of yourself and see what happens.”

That’s been my experience. The aspects of my life where I criticised myself most were where I was least successful. The criticism didn’t work and made me feel bad.

In case you worry that self-compassion will make you self-indulgent, Christopher Dines explains why this it won’t:

“To be self-compassionate is not to be self-indulgent or self-centred. A major component of self-compassion is to be kind to yourself. Treat yourself with love, care, dignity and make your wellbeing a priority. With self-compassion, we still hold ourselves accountable professionally and personally, but there are no toxic emotions inflicted upon and towards ourselves.”

Kristin Neff also says,

“With self-compassion, if you care about yourself, you do what’s healthy for you rather than what’s harmful to you.”

Many people worry that if they are compassionate towards themselves, that would be letting themselves off the hook. They imagine it means they would avoid responsibility for their actions and leave someone else to soak up the mess. But this could not be further from the truth. My experience is that the more compassionate I am with myself, the easier it is to say, “I messed up. I did it.” When we expect the world to cave in around us if we admit to a mistake, we avoid doing so. When we know that we are okay, even if what we did was foolish, unkind, careless or just plain ignorant, we aren’t afraid to admit our mistakes.

Here’s Neff again:

“Admitting that we’re fallible human beings doing the best we can and being compassionate to ourselves in the face of our misdeeds, actually allows us to take more responsibility for our actions.”

There’s another reason why practising self-compassion isn’t something to fear. Somehow, many of us have the idea that if we are compassionate towards ourselves, it means we will see ourselves as more deserving than others, or better than them. However, the opposite is true. Almost without fail, what we feel doubtful about or dislike in ourselves, we also dislike in others.

As Byron Katie says when describing how she used to live before she began questioning her stressful thoughts:

“‘Love thy neighbor as thyself.’ I always have. I hated me, I hated you.”

Osho agrees:

“If you don’t love yourself you will never be able to love anybody else.  Psychologically it is impossible. If you cannot be kind to yourself, how can you be kind to others?”

As we become more self-compassionate, we feel better about ourselves and have less need to look for flaws in others to make ourselves feel better.

Here’s Brene Brown explaining how that works:

“If I feel good about my parenting, I have no interest in judging other people’s choices. If I feel good about my body, I don’t go around making fun of other people’s weight or appearance. We’re hard on each other because we’re using each other as a launching pad out of our own perceived deficiency.”
I’m going to give the last word to Osho:

“Just being with somebody who accepts you totally is therapeutic. You will be healed.”

Okay, not quite the last word. Because, how about if you make that somebody yourself? You will be healed and you will be more able to help others heal!

Thank you for loving you!

This month, 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion continues to work toward a better world with a focus on Self Compassion.

Here’s how to get involved:

Join 1000 Voices Speak for Compassion on Facebook

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Category: Self-Compassion

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